Tim Maia, right, during his days in Tarrytown, NY, where he lived from 1959 – 1963. He formed this vocal-harmony group the Ideals with an Italian singer he met, and the group recorded one song – “New Love” – with lyrics by Maia. Maia re-recorded the song in 1973.

A few days back – 28 September 2016 – would have been the 74th birthday of the father of Brazilian soul music, Tim Maia. I meant to have this post up in time for the date, but got too caught up in the stories in Nelson Motta’s biography, Vale Tudo: Tim Maia. I decided to separate the post in two parts:The first covers Maia’s early life and the beginning of his career (1942 – 1970ish), and an upcoming post will focus on the 70s, 80s and 90s.

Childhood

Baby “Tião” Maia, Tijuca, Rio de Janeiro, c. 1946.

Sebastião “Tião” Maia (September 28, 1942 – March 14, 1998) grew up in Rio’s north-zone neighborhood of Tijuca. The youngest of twelve children, his irascible temperament and plumpish figure were signs of the spoiling he received starting early on, as the youngest of the clan; both would plague him throughout his life.

Tião’s father ran a fairly successful little restaurant, and Tião began delivering boxed meals – marmitas -for the restaurant at age 12. He spent the rest of his adolescence trying to rid himself of the unfortunate appellation the neighborhood kids gave him, “Tião Marmiteiro” – something like Tião Lunchbox Boy; his rocker personas were part of this attempt to shed that identity. As he pounded the pavement carrying meals on an iron rod over his shoulders, he sang radio hits, refining his voice.

When he was 13, Tião was allowed to take a different job, as an office boy with a local business, running odd errands around town. He was fired after three months for being disrespectful and talking back to his bosses, a portent of his professional future. He lasted even less time in his next job, and began to spend more and more time running around the city with friends, eating, playing soccer, singing and banging out beats on any can he could find. When he turned 15, he demanded a debutante ball, a luxury none of his sisters had indulged in, but which he felt he deserved – and his parents conceded.

The Beginning

The explosion of rock and roll in the United States in the mid-1950s reverberated over radio waves in Tijuca, where Maia became enraptured with the sounds and simple chords, which he quickly learned to imitate on the guitar.

Tim Maia playing with the Sputniks in 1957

Every day at 5 p.m. he tuned in to the Hora de Broadway on Rádio Metropolitana, where he listened to and perfected his imitations of the likes of Elvis Presley, Little Richard, and Chuck Barry. He began to hang out with other young local rock aficionados at Lanchonete Divino (address: Haddock Lobo, esquina com Matoso). The usual crowd at Divino included one of Tião’s old friends from the Tijuca soccer pitches, Erasmo Carlos, Jorge Ben, and Arlênio Lívio. One day in late 1957, Arlênio brought along another friend to sing for Tião: Roberto Carlos. Tião invited Roberto to be the fifth member of the rock band he was forming with Arlênio, Edson Trindade and Wellington Oliveira, the Sputniks. And through this crowd, Roberto Carlos met Erasmo Carlos, who would become one of his greatest musical partners over the next half-century.

The Nickname “Tim”

The Sputniks kids auditioned for local rock big-shot Carlos Imperial, who invited them for their one and only TV appearance on his segment Clube do Rock – the beginning of the end for the group. Back stage after the performance, Roberto sang a solo Elvis impression for Imperial, who invited him to perform alone on an upcoming program. Tião felt jealous and betrayed when he heard the news, and the ensuing fight signaled the end of the Sputniks. On the program, Imperial announced Roberto Carlos as the “Brazilian Elvis Presley.” Trying to swallow his rage, Maia determined that he preferred to be the Brazilian Little Richard anyway – their extravagant, brash-black styles were much more in sync. He tracked down Imperial and belted out “Long Tall Sally“; Imperial scheduled him for the show, suggesting he go by a more stage-friendly nickname, Tim.

Bossa Nova and New York

João Gilberto and Tom Jobim in front of Copacabana Palaca, 1961.

But just when rock seemed to be taking off in Tijuca, the late 50s brought dramatic changes: Between late 1957 and early 1959, Elvis Presley went into military service in Germany; Little Richard became an ordained minister of the Seventh Day Adventist Church; and Buddy Holly died in a plane crash in February 1959 – the same month Maia’s father passed away. Meanwhile, João Gilberto released Chega de Saudade, the archetypal album of bossa nova.Suddenly the upper-class crowd from Rio’s beachside Zona Sul dominated the music scene across Rio and Brazil, with chords and harmonies that Tim had never even imagined.

Frustrated by the flagging rock scene and fascinated by the bossa nova boom, Maia and Roberto Carlos struggled to break into that scene with the help of well-connected Carlos Imperial, but to no avail. So, taking advantage of the relative sense of liberty that came with the death of his father, Maia gathered what amounted to almost nothing and caught a church-sponsored plane to New York.

A former client of the family restaurant gave him a letter with the address of a woman who had married an Irish New Yorker thirty years prior. After myriad mishaps, Maia was warmly received by the woman’s family in a cozy, Tarrytown, NY, home. Fortunately they had a son born on the exact same day – 28 September, 1942 – a coincidence which warmed their hearts to Tim.

Maia quickly became fluent in the slangy English spoken by the blacks and Puerto Ricans he hung out with in Tarrytown, and became increasingly infatuated with the rock and soul music that now surrounded him. He took odd jobs as long as they’d put up with him, and when he tired of the comfy suburban life, he moved in with questionable characters in a gritty part of town. From then on he essentially couch-surfed, sometimes passing cold nights on the heated NYC subway trains when he had the money for the fare.

In late 1961, he met Felix De Masi, an Italian singer, and together they formed the vocal group The Ideals, and recorded one song, with lyrics by Maia – “New Love” – which Tim re-recorded in 1973.

Finally, Maia made his way out of the suburbs, to Manhattan, where he found a job that made more sense for him: janitor in an old-folks home. He earned room and board, and was closer to the vibrant music scene, frequenting the Village and Harlem’s famous Apollo Theater.

Road Trip, Prison and Deportation

But with the arrival of winter 1963, Tim decided to steal a car with friends and head south with plenty of pot for the road. On the trip he was arrested five times, the last time charged with car theft and thrown in a Florida jail, where he spent six months before being deported. He disembarked in Rio in April 1964: the country was now run by the recently installed military dictatorship, and to his surprise, his old Tijuca buddiesRoberto Carlos, Erasmo Carlos and Jorge Ben Jor had moved to São Paulo and were blowing up on the radio.

Maia managed to land some jobs as a tour guide with his good English, but his lackluster knowledge of the city’s geography and history meant he didn’t last very long in the field. And it didn’t take too long for him to get thrown back in jail again: In early 1966, he was caught stealing a table and chairs from a home in Tijuca – an attempt to finance an upcoming recording.As he completed his ten-month prison sentence, he looked on in helpless dismay as his old friends from Lanchonette Divino became stars.

São Paulo and the Jovem Guarda

October 1966: Roberto Carlos was crowned the “Rei da Jovem Guarda”

Immediately after he was released from jail Maia scrambled onto a bus to São Paulo, armed with two full cans of condensed milk to drink along the way. He went directly to TV Record, where he tried to make his way into the rock program Jovem Guardawith Roberto and Erasmo. But for months Tim had no luck even talking to Roberto, much less making it onto the stage. He finally managed to earn an appearance on the show after he caught up with Roberto’s wife, Nice, in Rio, in 1967. But he was bitterly disappointed by the rather straight-edge audience’s reception of his black, soul sound.

“Não vou ficar”

L-R: Erasmo Carlos, Tim Maia, and Roberto Carlos, c. 1969.

Still convinced that he deserved the same – actually more – fame and adulation as his old friends, Tim sought out Roberto Carlos and Nice at their São Paulo apartment to show them his composition “Você,” which Eduardo Araújo was preparing to record. They liked it, but Roberto wanted something rougher, with more swing – and that another singer wasn’t already getting ready to release. Roberto said he’d record it if Tim brought it.

Tim anxiously composed “Não vou ficar” and brought it back to Roberto, with the arrangement already in mind. Roberto kept his word, recorded the song, and it was a hit across the country, received as the mark of a new, grittier, more adult period for Carlos .

“Azul da cor do mar”

Fábio and Tim Maia

The tremendous success of “Não vou ficar” opened doors for Tim, who received an invitation to record a compact with Polydor in Rio de Janeiro. Still in São Paulo, Tim ran into the popular Rio-based Paraguayan singer Fábio, whom he had met through an acquaintance from Tijuca, Almir Ricardi, and who was an early admirer of Tim’s soul style. Maia told Fábio that he would be moving back to Rio de Janeiro and brazenly asked Fábio if he could stay at his apartment. Fábio conceded.

Soon after, Maia arrived in Rio de Janeiro to record the compact with Polydor. Crashing at Fábio’s, he found himself sleeping on an uncomfortable couch as Fábio and his producer Gláuco received girl after girl in their private rooms. He felt alone and frustrated. When Fábio and Glaúco traveled to Salvador, he moved into Gláuco’s room, where he could still smell the girls’ perfume on the sheets, and felt even more lonesome in the empty apartment. As he gazed at a poster on the wall, with a naked girl in front of blue Tahitian sea, he composed “Azul da cor do mar.” Fábio listened to Tim sing the song when he returned to the apartment, and exclaimed: “Carajo, brother, you’ve just written the song of your life!” Tim recorded the song for his first LP, also with Polydor, and indeed the public loved it – more out of appreciation for Maia’s tremendous voice and fresh soul style than for any particular aspect of the song itself.

Elis and “These are the songs”

Tim and Elis

In early 1969, Nelson Motta, Maia’s biographer, had just taken a job as a record producer with Phillips, and was assigned to produce for Elis Regina, to this day perhaps Brazil’s most beloved female singer of all time. Elis was looking for a new sound to record, and when Motta heard Tim Maia’s recording of “Primavera” (Cassiano & Silvio Rochiel) and “Jurema” on that simple compact Maia had recorded while staying with Fábio, Motta had a feeling this was just what Elis was looking for. He scheduled a meeting in Rio with Tim, Elis, Wilson das Neves, and other musicians recording with Elis.

Tim arrived at the studio on his best behavior and played two songs, the second being “These are the songs” – half in English, half in Portuguese; half soul, half bossa nova. Elis and Motta loved it. Elis asked him to play it again, and started singing along as the musicians in the studio started playing around with accompaniments. They quickly moved on to recording. After a few takes, Motta recalls, “More than a duet, the recording was turning into a duel between two giants, two styles, two very different schools, each one wanting to sing better than the other.” The president of Phillips heard the recording and loved it. Tim went to São Paulo with Elis and the musicians, and received advanced royalties from the album, which the Phillips execs knew was going to blow up. The recognition also was a tremendous boost for his first LP, which he was just finishing recording with Polydor. Everything finally seemed to have come in place for his career to take off.

Main source for this post: Vale Tudo: Tim Maia by Nelson Motta, and A Canção no Tempo: 85 anos de músicas brasileiras, vol.2, by Jairo Severiano and Zuza Homem de Mello